7.1294°S, 78.8453°W.
Kuntur Wasi ("House of the Condor" in Quechua) is a Formative-period ceremonial complex in the northern Peruvian Andes of the Cajamarca region, dated between approximately 1100 and 50 BCE. The site is constructed on a stepped stone platform rising in successive terraces faced with cut and fitted andesite blocks, with a sunken circular plaza, carved monoliths, and several small stone-built temples. Kuntur Wasi is famous for the discovery in 1989 of the earliest known elaborate gold ornaments in South America — a cache of crowns, pectorals, and ear ornaments dating to approximately 800 BCE, recovered from elite tombs by the University of Tokyo expedition under Yoshio Onuki. The site is contemporary with and stylistically related to the Chavín cult that spread across the central Andes during the same period.
Kuntur Wasi is an Andean stone temple where the oldest worked gold in South America was found, in a tomb sealed since 800 BCE.